Mechanical tomato harvesters have established an important position in the harvesting art. Almost all cannery tomatoes presently being grown in California, for example, are harvested by mechanical means.
In the early stages of mechanical tomato harvesting, empty boxes, or bins, were carried on the machine. When a bin was filled it was transferred to a suitable vehicle for removal to a staging area or receiving station.
More recently, bulk trailers have come into favor. A bulk trailer is located alongside the harvester and advances along the row being harvested in unison with the harvester. When a bulk trailer is filled, it is hauled away and replaced by an empty trailer. Handling is thereby minimized with a consequent improvement in product quality and reduction in costs.
One difficulty with the use of bulk trailers is that as the trailer moves alongside the harvester, the combined widths of the harvester, and the bulk trailer are such that a wide unobstructed avenue is required. Such a requirement can sometimes be met where the initial pass of the harvester is made along an outside row in the field to be harvested and where a path suitable for the bulk trailer is available next to the outside row.
In most cases, however, there is either no suitable path alongside the outside row or the most efficient harvesting pattern for the particular field dictates some other sequence. Where several harvesters are used in a single field, for example, it is frequently desirable to separate the harvesters into different areas in the field and have them harvest simultaneously so as to pick the entire crop at the time of optimum yield.
Efficient mechanical harvesting, in other words, can often most advantageously be achieved by providing one or more clear avenues, or paths, along which bulk trailers can be advanced while receiving the output of an adjacent harvester.
Prior art of interest in connection with harvesting methods is B. C. Thompson U.S. Pat. No. 3,090,183 dated May 21, 1963; and C. W. Hart U.S. Pat. No. 3,475,886 dated Nov. 4, 1969.